


Falling back on forever, I wonder what you came to be

by I_am_sorry



Series: Once in a lifetime, the suffering of fools. [1]
Category: Marvel, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: 4 + 1 things, Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Spoilers, Civil War (Marvel), M/M, Not A Fix-It, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Retrospective, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-27
Updated: 2016-05-27
Packaged: 2018-07-10 12:11:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6984556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_am_sorry/pseuds/I_am_sorry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[Post-Civil War] Two months after the battle in Siberia, two months after everything that happened --the phone and the apology; the hurt and the lies-- Steve starts sending letters that Tony refuses to read.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Falling back on forever, I wonder what you came to be

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Я спрашивал себя, каким ты станешь](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9460880) by [Savarna_Scaramouche](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Savarna_Scaramouche/pseuds/Savarna_Scaramouche), [WTF_Avengers_2017](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WTF_Avengers_2017/pseuds/WTF_Avengers_2017)



i.

When the second letter arrives, Tony can't really say that he feels surprised. He doesn't feel much of anything these days to be very frank. The paper seems innocent enough, white, brittle, carefully folded --and so utterly meaningless-- with blue ink and Steve's plain handwriting. He wonders idly what could be there left to say for Steve to send him another pleasantry like this. The truth is Tony doesn't have anything else to say. The truth is Tony doesn’t have anything else to hear.

He rips the paper in half, and then repeats the motion again and again and again --until there are only shreds left. Little pieces of what once was and it's curious because somehow the effect of it is calming, freeing in a sense.

Two months ago he would have probably (and by probably, Tony means definitely) read it anyway because after the first attempt of Steve to reach a communication Tony thought maybe it was something like an mismatched –broken and twisted- olive branch. He thought maybe. He thought about compromises and teamwork and making it work again. He supposes back then in the aftermath of everything, he thought a lot of things –he doesn’t remember half of it. He doesn’t want to.

“Mr. Stark?” Vision calls to him slowly (carefully) as if Tony will break at minimal pressure and it’s funny because Tony knows broken, he knows it, has felt it before but this, this… this is not.

“Yeah?”

“Would you like a cup of coffee?”

They are in the kitchen and Vision has been attempting to cook for some nights these past few weeks. He is not getting better at it but he tries anyway and Tony shrugs because of all the poisons he favors in the world coffee is the less lethal and he has always liked it –and sometimes Maria Stark used to prepare it for him. Black with a lot of sugar and… it was a lifetime ago, possibly.

The coffee is steaming when Vision hands it to him and Tony can see how he very carefully tries to look as if he is not looking the bits of white paper scattered in the counter.

“Humanity seems contradictory at the best of times. I do not presume of understanding it of course.” Vision says as he nods towards what once was a letter.

“Wanda is doing okay, loverboy.” Tony doesn’t look up from his steaming mug of coffee to see (to understand, to dissect) Vision’s reaction. It’s not his business and well in a twisted kind of creepy way this thing Vision and Wanda had could have been even called cute.

There’s a pause and the when Vision speaks again he seems his normal self. “I thought you hadn’t read the letter.”

“I didn’t read it, there’s stark technology and satellites monitoring every country, looking for dangers, people… and sometimes it alerts me about threats. I know enough to know they are not one, I also know enough to tell you they are alright,”

And he does know. The minimal, what could be called the necessary –he doesn’t know more, just pictures that sometimes the satellites catch.

“And what about you?”

Tony swallows a third part of the coffee (and it’s not the best he has had but then again he has had five stars restaurant’s coffee and… and he has had his… his mother coffee and…) in one go. It’s hot and bitter and it scalds. “Peachy just you know next time maybe you could try making a latte, although this one wasn’t that bad and I could buy you a machine… or build you a machine for lattes if it strikes your fancy anyway--”

“I will think about it.”

“Be my guest.”

“Mr. Stark?” Vision tries again.

“Yeah?”

“I may not be… let me rephrase it… I may not understand how to be human and I may not follow the meaning behind emotions but I wouldn’t mind making you coffee whenever you would need it.”

Tony looks up at that and Vision nods ready to turn away and disappear into the big Avengers complex to go and do whatever the hell is that he does in his spare time. “Thanks,” Tony says and he means it. He understands the he has always been more at ease with computers and technology and robots than with people –he understands Vision’s friendship.

“Anytime.” Vision says and then goes.

‘Anytime’ Tony repeats and stays in the kitchen until the coffee goes cold.

 

ii.

“And what it is that you expect me to do with it?” Tony asks as he looks at the envelope Natasha has been holding between her well-manicured hands for the last fifteen minutes.

“I don’t expect you to do anything with it,” She says and shrugs. “Steve expects you to read it though.”

Tony narrows his eyes –a parody of confusion- and shakes his head. “But whatever happened to confidentiality these days dear? The good old Cap and I were having this secret letter affair thing and here I was feeling special but now it turns out you are in it too.”

Natasha shrugs again. “You know how curiosity killed the cat.”

Tony sighs after a while and understands she is here with a purpose and that she will not be leaving until having achieved it. Agent Romanov and her need to finish the mission. Agent Romanov and her need to follow her own rules to succeed in the mission –Agent Romanov and her way of saying fuck it to that same mission when it doesn’t go as she planned.

“Just what do you want Nat?” Tony concedes finally because it’s late and he has just finished assisting in a charity event of Maria’s Stark foundation for all the widows affected in the Sokovia incident. He should be in his car right now, driving towards the complex and making a good time to avoid traffic, instead he is here –in the parking lot, wasting time with something that seems beside the point.

“Steve wants you to read this,” She says perfectly calm, waving the white envelope in front of his face.

“Why would he send it with you now? All the others have come with the mail.” It’s the sixth one. It’s the sixth letter Rogers has sent him in the span of these five months after the Siberia occurrence –after the jail-breaking and all that.

Natasha tilts her head, narrows her eyes (there’s something curious if inquisitive in her gaze). “Steve thinks you aren’t reading them… a… naiver party of the people who are with him thinks maybe you are and that you would like to say something… answer Steve’s letters and yet you don’t have an address and that’s why one way or another I’m here. So which one is it?”

“I just got disappointed in this whole letter business after my letter never made it to Santa Claus.”

“He knows you well enough,” Natasha says, crossing her arms. “you haven’t read all the other letters he has sent you then.”

“I need to get going Nat--”

“Just read it.”

“Fine, give it to me. I’ll read it once I arrive home.”

“Right now.”

Tony unlocks his car and gets in. “It wouldn’t be very wise to read while driving, don’t you think?”

“I hope you know what you are doing Tony. I hope the both of you know.” Natasha says as she crumples the letter in her hands.

Tony doesn’t say anything at that just nods, (in what it could be interpreted as thank you, a good bye or a see you soon. Or maybe the three together) starts the car and thinks of going home –thinks of wanting to stay in his workshop for a very, very long time.

 

iii.

“Mr. Stark?” Someone says and… What it is with all this people suddenly calling him, Mr. Stark? Tony is not Mr. Stark, Howard was. Tony has never felt like Mr. Stark, not really, not even in his darkest hours with his throat filled to the brim with scotch.

“Yep?”

“I thought… You aren’t listening, are you?”

“I am,” Tony says even if it’s not true –somehow it seems important that he does. “I’m listening.”

“I got a letter.”

Tony stills and by doing so, he notices he had been pacing –he is not sure why. “A letter?”

“Yes, uh… you know… it was from—you know what, I don’t think it’s that important. I will keep explaining my science project and hopefully you can tell me if there’s anything I’m missing. Bioengineering can get messy.”

Tony blinks and the world turns slowly to color. He focuses in the place he is standing (a room), the person he is speaking with (Peter) and the last bit of information he received. “A letter? A letter from whom?” Tony knows –of course that he knows-- who sent the letter but there’s an amusing thing with him and trust going on right now so...

He is fond of Peter, the kid is brilliant and Tony wants to help him, to be always there like this cool big brother figure –because Tony refuses, he just plainly refuses to make parental analogies—but…

“Steve Rogers,” Peter says after a while and Tony feels like a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. He exhales and finally flops down over Peter’s bed.

“What did he say?” Tony looks up at Peter’s ceiling. It’s cream colored and has marron spots in some places, maybe from a leaking.

“You know it was bit estrange but… still, I mean Capitain America sent me a letter so…”

“Peter,” Tony warns and hopes the kid doesn’t get sidetracked again.

“Ah, um yeah.. I, uh, something about me being a good kid? That I had to do my best at school and how he hoped we could be friends one day but more than that… something about looking after you Mr. Stark...”

“He did that, huh?”

“Yeah uh, in fact, I—well the letter was for me but I felt like a big portion of it was directed at you…somehow… would you like to read it?”

“Nah,” Tony suspected as much. “I’ll be taking a nap, you go and finish that project and when is done come and fetch me.” Peter just looks at him as if he has grown two heads –because yes, Tony Stark has decided that he will take a nap in a little bed in an simple apartment from Queens in the middle of a Sunday morning. It must make a picture, Tony thinks, him relaxing with his expensive three pieces suit and his Italian leather shoes over an old looking and many times washed flowery quilt. “Well, what you keep waiting for? Shoo! Go kid!”

Surprisingly enough sleep comes easily to him this time.

 

iv.

With Rhodey it’s easier but then again with Rhodey it always has been that way.

By the time he gets the eighth letter, there’s nothing much to say about it or it’s sender anymore except, you know, fuck it and of course Rhodes gets it and then the both of them agree to see how the letter turns to ashes as they burn it in the yard.

The yard where Rhodes makes himself walk over and over until he can get the illusion of having his legs respond as his own again –as they used to be, not with a mechanical prosthesis guiding his every step-- for a few minutes a day.

 

v.

“So what? What it is now? Why did you call me here?” Tony asks and he sounds angry, defensive maybe but he can’t help it, it’s been a year – a whole year of dealing with the government, of dealing with Rhodes and his paralysis, of dealing with his unparalleled growing distrust towards everything and everyone who surrounds him. It’s been a year and Steve fucking Rogers decided to call him today of all days (to that horrible piece of outdated tech) and ask, plead for an amnesty.

Of course Steve is asking Tony and of course Steve seems sincere enough –but that’s not the issue here, because even while trying to make a truce in this godforsaken place (what Tony suspects it was once an aquarium) in Canada, half and miles away from Siberia Steve still doesn’t think he did the wrong thing.

Tony can see it in his eyes as blue and as reflective as the ocean. Steve is sorry, yes –maybe about the loss of his friendship, maybe about the loss of the remaining avengers who didn’t go with him, maybe about his loss of his economic provider, who knows?—but he doesn’t regret it, he doesn’t think he was in the wrong and he is apologizing for the outcome not the means.

And Tony can see it all too well.

“I just wanted to talk,” Steve says and shrugs as if they are old friends or worse... just a couple of –something- who just haven’t had the time to talk after a minor fight for something as trifle as who’s turn was to wash the dishes yesterday.

“So talk,” Tony doesn’t take his sun-glasses off or even attempts the not-threatening posture Steve has been showing him all this time. “and make it quick because I’ve things to do, a company to run and awesome technology to invent.”

“Is good to see you are doing good Tony.”

Tony shakes his head and… he is not doing this. He is not.

“Please don’t do this,” Steve starts and to be fair Tony hasn’t done anything yet but he is already thinking about doing it –thinking about moving, going away, leaving and forgetting he ever came here.

“I want to talk… we could talk Tony. There are things I would like to tell you if you would let me.”

“Just,” Tony pauses, stills himself. “just tell me, are you sorry?”

“I’m sorry I kept things from you.”

“But you are not sorry for everything else.”

Steve stands there, arms behind his back. Impassive. “I’m sorry I hurt you,”

“No. No Rogers, this doesn’t work like that. I won’t apologize back if that’s what you are expecting for me. I won’t apologize for having done what needed to be done. What you could not do and this,” Tony says every word sounding calmer than he honestly expected. “this will never work. Want to know why?”

“Tony--”

“Because, we will always end back to square one; there will be a day, I don’t know… we have dealt with enough crazy before… so there will come the day when another alien invasion threatens our planet or maybe another robot with enough issues to fill an entire psychiatry building comes knocking at our door or the girlfriend of that robot… I don’t know, maybe, there will be a day when someone alerts us another earth will collide with our own and you know what, I’ll stand there and watch the other side burn. I’ll go ahead and destroy it to spare all the innocents here but you? You won’t agree with it, will you?”

“Tony this is not the iss—”

“No, but it is. Because in the end I’ll do what needs to be done, in the end I’ll always take the hard path and you, you will never understand.”

“You are telling me we can never go back then?” Steve asks and suddenly he looks younger and older at the same time. He looks tired. “Have you read any of my letters?”

They both know Tony hasn’t.

“I thought maybe you got bored with so many words so… so I made you a sketch book, I sent it today. The people in the mail office told me, it would arrive in four days from now. Will you look at it?”

“Not this week.”

It’s not a definitive answer but it is something. Steve nods. Silence comes heavy after that. It’s what they are now –just silence and pauses and memories of better times.

Who knows? Maybe is all they were ever meant to be.

**Author's Note:**

> So I saw Civil War two days ago and this happened. This work could be taken as Gen but I would like to think of it as Stony.


End file.
